Waiting
by Bistre Melancholia
Summary: And if the prince does not come? Revisting the princesses and their endings.
1. Cinderella

**A tale of a neverlasting false love from a girl who rose from cinders.**

He promised that you would be there. You were. He promised that you would look at me. You did. He promised that you would fall in love with the girl in the dress. He lied.

He offers me everything in one simple wish. Wealth, power, and the envy of others. It would all be mine, if I just sign the paper, the deed to my soul, for what use is a soul to me?

For that trifle, he gives me the prince. No longer will I have to work. No longer will I have to bow down to those wretched women who dare call me their kin. No longer will I be poor subservient Cinderella, belittled and ridiculed.

He says the dress is enchanted. Whoever wears it will charm the prince. He will know of no other. Could I have resisted? Should I have?

I give him my worthless soul. It cries, begs, screaming as it's torn asunder. It's almost pleasant, an ode to my great fortune.

I don the dress. The folds shimmer as I move, like scales on an oriental fish.

I am so close.

He smiles (_sneers_) and whispers that I will have to walk. Do I have any shoes?

I don't and he knows, wicked joy spreading across his face. He offers me the heels. Do I try even resist?

I take the shoes, red like apples, like heated coals, like pure temptation.

I walk to the castle, to my future no longer uncertain. I ignore the pain I feel in my soles.

I reach the castle, upright and regal, every bit the future queen. I see the guards and lie charmingly. A "Oh, I was taking a walk. It_ is_ such a beautiful night." and the gates swing open to paradise. They don't spare a glance to my feet, bleeding from the walk, marking me as an imposter. Little birds do not sing.

I enter the castle and see you, the prince. No wonder you could never wed anyone worthy of your station. One look and I begin to dread life and wish for death.

Was this to be my husband?

It will be better than my other life though….wouldn't it?

You look at me, and I avert my eyes in a display of submission, hopefully hiding my blatant disgust.

It works; you are taken by me and rush over, deformed hands pushing though the crowd. This whole ball is joke. The king couldn't be this blind.

I put on a strained smile and force my eyes to meet yours. You smile as well, yellowed, rotting teeth peek through blue lips. Ask me to dance. Let this be over with.

And you do, spitting out the request in your hoarse guttural voice, a simple waltz. Can your bent and crippled figure even manage that?

You shower me with compliments as we stumble around the floor: my dress is of the most enchanting quality, how did I know that he loved the color rose, everything matched me perfectly.

Every word spews noxious fumes into my face, yet I blush and giggle. I simper over your comments. I find out that I can act better than I ever imagined.

The song is over and I hint at marriage, my voice dripping honey sweet. "Wouldn't it be great to be like this forever? Every day, being with me" I tell you.

'Wouldn't it be horrible? Every day trapped here with you.' I think.

You agree.

The marriage is on the eighth, the next day. Everyone thought it to be too early, that you made a rash decision, that I, a mere peasant girl, couldn't do this.

I take off the dress, heavy with imagined malevolent aura, weighed down with baubles like sin. Yet I traded my soul for it, so did I truly expect better?

When the day of the wedding arrives, I am wrapped in a black dress. In my soon to be triumph, I fancy it to be of the finest silk, innocent white, not an antique spare for an unexpected union, for a rough, uncouth bride, for a monster groom.

I stand at the altar, grand and foreboding, staring at the priest whose eyes see through my deception. I smile. He can't stop me. No one can.

I wait and wait and wait…

but yet…

you do not come.

I place once more a mask upon my face, this time of worry and concern. I look for you.

I find you.

You sit in my hastily arraigned bedroom, clutching yesterday's gown, as if it were salvation, in the meaty paddles that you call hands.

"I'm here. Where were you?" I say lightly.

He lied. You had fallen for the dress.

You reply "I am in love."


	2. Sleeping Beauty

**A repetitive study in consciousness, existence, and madness told from a sleeping beauty.**

* * *

You are alive.

* * *

You walk out of the walls of the tower and into the forest. You feel the dew-kissed grass beneath your bare feet and see only in shades of green. You walk.

You hear the birds chirping, singing, courting each other with their song, and you look up. They are in love. Their song is not for you. They do not see you, only each other. You walk.

You breathe. The scent of fragrant blooms fills the air, and you smile. You're happy though you know it's not for you that the flowers release their perfume, honeysuckle and rose, not for you do they burst in colors, painting reds and violets and yellows over green. You walk.

You see mother and father. They see a beautiful daughter, a prodigy, a treaty. You part you lips and tell them that you love them. They do not hear you. They do not see you. You walk.

You feel the spirits of the forest, of the trees. They whisper to each other in their own little world. Their leaves brush against each other, telling secrets and sweet everythings. They do not like you, an interloper into sacred grounds. They are not like you. You are not welcome here. You walk.

You walk, and there he is. A prince. He does not look at you but at himself. He thinks and ponders. He reads. He does not sing. He does not speak. He does not love. You leave.

* * *

You are dead.

* * *

The forest is still there. You walk out of the walls of the tower and into your mind. You still feel the wetness of the ground and see only in greens, though you wonder why everything seems paler. You walk.

You hear the birds again. Do they mourn for you? No. They never saw you. You look up once more and see their children. They sing, but for not you. It will never be for you. It's hard to walk.

You breathe. Your lungs fill with fog and flowers. There are no white lilies for your death. Instead brilliant daffodils, coquettish daisies, even elegant red roses in bouquets of their own peek through the green. You smile, but it doesn't matter. You never existed for them. It's hard to walk.

You see mother and father, still majestic and young. They have no tears for you. They never knew you. It's hard to walk.

You feel the spirits of the forest, but they are unfamiliar. They never acknowledged you, for you never were. Did you actually think that they would? It's hard to walk.

But you do, and there he is still. You wonder why he does not come to save you. You wonder why you are still here. You fall.

* * *

You are waiting.

* * *

The forest, the birds, mother and father, the trees, a prince, you. Are they real? You do not know. All you feel, all you hear, all you see, all you taste, all you smell is gray. You cannot walk.

You lie and wonder in this clouded wasteland.

Did this story ever begin?

Will it ever end?

Phantom lips touch yours. You wake. There is no one there.

Tick Tock. The curse is set. Tick Tock. The spell is broken.

If you are nothing to them, do you really exist at all?

* * *

You are empty.


	3. Snow White

**The empty dream of a glass figurine.**

Drip…drip…drip…

Rain washed over glass hair, glass face, glass hands, washing away pigeon gifts and the smattering of dirt on glass feet.

There were rumors in the city about the glasswork statue that stood on a small hill near an old cottage. A masterpiece they all praised, realism personified, humanity captured, but…wasn't there something not quite right about it?

The statue of was of a simple nature, a girl, perhaps of seven, perhaps of seventeen, standing frozen, eyes closed, forever taking a bite of a glass apple. A moment in time encased in delicate transparency.

Every Sunday, the old caretaker would come out and open the large gates to his grassy knolled Arcadia, allowing the people of the town to view the little girl trapped, to admire the craftsmanship, for did not those tears look real, as if the apple was the bitterest of poisons to be forced down an unwilling throat, did not the shimmering locks look soft to the touch, as if the teeth of a comb had recently glided through, did not the lips look pliant and waiting?

Sometimes, the little glass girl would seem to speak, a disembodied voice floating from sugar-spun clouds and imagined pink daisy mouth, and would ask for her prince in white.

And sometimes, one would almost reach out and touch the statue and kiss those sleeping lips.

But then…the caretaker would shout, though what depended on his moods, which seemed to cycle as frequently as days of the week, and one's eyes would open to lips pressed against the apple instead.

As more and more people fell to madness near the statue, convinced that the little glass girl was truly alive, that she had been trapped by a wicked queen, that she needed only her true love's kiss to wake, the city councilors became worried, which of course was their job to be.

And so in their distress and ignorance, they passed an ordinance, city ordinance 2238a, that prohibited anyone to be on the old caretaker's property, including the old caretaker himself.

Slowly, slowly, slowly did the glass statue wither. Where there once was smooth glass skin, lined imperceptibly with the most natural of creases, now there were hundreds of thin fractures, formed almost as if from a burden of despair and lost hope weighed down on the fragile glass girl.

Then one day lightening stuck the weakened glass, shattering it in an explosion of melting colors and false rainbows.

Among the confusion and violent beauty, a pale image of a girl that was once upon a time had skin as white as snow, lips as red as blood, and hair as black as ebony smiled.

"A shame", she whispered as her ghost fluttered into the charged air, "No one came after all."


	4. Beauty and the Beast

**The assassination of a beast by an unrepentant beauty.**

You lie in a crumpled heap on the ground, blood flowing freely, coloring your rough coat a brilliant red. Let it be said that you died with dignity, befitting the man you once were. No struggle, no resistance, no animal-like frenzy. Frankly I expected more, though I would be the first to admit that looks are deceiving, or perhaps that would have been you.

I wait to see if you are truly dead, idly watching as roses bloomed from soft fur soil, as they congealed and wilted when the chill settled between your bones. I wonder whether you would have been cheered or depressed by that. You always loved roses, seeking company in the deceptive flowers that are more thorns than charm.

I smile lightly and bid farewell to you, your eyes still open in an expression of quiet resignation, of almost happiness.

Time passes, and yet you remain my favorite. As they lead me to the guillotine for the murder of some faceless foreign prince, one of the many that I had the pleasure of meeting, I almost wish that this punishment was for your death, instead of his.

I step up on the platform, flippant and proud, as though this isn't the ceremony for my beheading. The executioner asks me for my forgiveness, pretending he needs an assassin's grace, and when I grant it, my final words.

Like with everything else, I steal yours.

"I have no regrets but a wonderful time."


	5. Rapunzel

**A girl in melancholy splashed grey.**

You think about jumping. The tower is high and the thorns beneath are sharp. One step and you can be free. Free of this witch, this tower, this life not worth living.

But then clatter of iron chains wakes you from this silly dream, a fool's fantasy if there ever was. You smile lightly, touching each metal clamp, bracelets for the fettered. No, no, you will never escape. The witch needs virgin's hair.

And there she is now, calling sweetly for her Rapunzel. You answer complacently; hints of hidden misery lace your voice. She appears in the tower, a sparkle of her magic still lingering in the air, and calls once more that mocking epithet, reminding you of your parents' idiocy and sin.

She tilts your chin up and remarks how pretty you've become. "What a waste", she says, "you would have fetched quite a price had that father of yours not been so careless."

You look at her, not listening but wondering, wondering if she'll ever age, if she'll ever die. You wish almost selfishly that she would.

She sets down your meal and begins clipping a few locks of your hair. As she does, you ask why you must stay here in this tower. She pauses for a moment, smiling sadly, but makes no reply.

She leaves.

You eat the food, savoring the taste of sawdust and needles, and fall into sleepless slumber.

Months pass as the witch appears less and less. Your hair grows long without her, flowing out of the tower like honeyed hay, lovely and expendable, a mimicry of you.

You talk to yourself, speaking of the places you've been, the people you've met, the truths you've never told in this reality that never really existed.

…

You find shapes in the stone walls, a cat, a dog, a do you really know?

…

You do absolutely nothing at all.

…

Then one day, you hear a man's voice calling. You do not speak.

You feel a dull pain in your scalp, and you think about moving. Though it's is rather tedious, moving ...

You see him. He pulls himself up into the small tower and sees you as well.

Your mind flickers and tells you this is a human, like you.

He opens his mouth, speaking your mind supplies. You couldn't care less.

He comes closer now, hands on your face, your chest, your hips…then_ lower_. He whispers words that are as meaningless to you as they are to him.

Is this appropriate? Your mind asks.

Does it really matter? A trade, an ingredient, a whore. Is there much difference? You were meant to be used.

You no longer think, watching with hollow eyes as he leaves.

More time passes.

The witch visits again, trimming your overgrown hair.

Again.

Again.

She appears once more, frustrated. Nothing is working.

A light sigh escapes her poppy colored lips, as she undoes the manacles, the rust spilling to skin. It can be nothing else. There is no need for you anymore.

She lets you go.

You lie in the field where she leaves you.

You are finally free.

And yet, you find yourself indifferent.

…

Do you even care?


	6. Twelve Dancing Princesses

**A fantasy for desperation.**

She would sit in front of the mirror everyday, frozen before her reflection, and would imagine that she was beautiful.

She would have hair, lovely locks spun as if from gold. She would have smooth milk skin with nary a mark blemishing it. But most of all, her mirror-self would have the most enchanting eyes; green with flecks of sliver embedded within, a treasure within a treasure.

People would love her in this mirror world, where princes were always in season and balls were thrown for the most mundane of occasions.

She would have sisters in this wondrous world of hers. Eleven sisters and she would be the twelfth, the loveliest and most adored.

She would have suitors, so many suitors, all handsome and kind and with a loyal steed. It would be marvelous to talk to every single one, listening to their infinite praise, and say, "Oh how absolutely witty you are Prince So-and-so!"

Then they would kneel and propose, proffering a ring or a single red rose. And she would say "No," and smile charmingly. And they wouldn't be angry at all, for they would love her too much to be angry. Oh no, they would be disappointed of course, but then they would become her knight or something of that sort

Her sisters would smile then and take her to a dance, a most secret of dances to celebrate their freedom. And at this dance, the fairies would show, flitting and flirting about her sisters. And at this dance there would be her one true love, a farmer's boy or cowherd or something equally unsuitable for a princess like her.

He would take her hand and walk with her around this world within a world. He would show her the boats by the gilded trees and confess his unwavering adoration. It would be absolutely perfect and because it would be, she would forget to pretend.

She would touch her face, covered in pox and framed by the memory of hair.

She would open her eyes and see nothing at all.

Perhaps that would be for the best though. Had she seen what was in the mirror, her maiden heart would surely break.

Because in the cool glass mirror was a boy, young and fragile, stricken with disease that stole his sight and his looks and his memories.


	7. Little Mermaid

**An Ariel that never reached the air**

The sound of waves breaking on the shore stirs her from her reverie as she stares at the blood dripping down her pale legs. 'How curious', she thinks, 'even his blood is not like mine.'

She takes once more glance at the prince who never loved her, lying dead near his new bride, and walks away.

She rejoins the sea, her legs and feet melting back into a scaled tail. Her sisters crowd around her, delicate long hair gone, a petty sacrifice for their youngest sibling. They smile and tell her that it was for the best, that the prince had been ungrateful, that her life was worth much more than his.

Was it for the best? For who?

The prince, his soul lost in the heavens?

The princess, waking to the corpse of her beloved?

Herself, hands stained with carmine red, a mark of sin for slaughtering he who held her heart? Though…

He had been rather ungrateful, constantly asking her to dance while her feet bled light, and then marrying another but … he hadn't known that dancing was the most horrible of tortures to her (she had put on a very convincing air of enjoying it), and…he had loved the princess before her anyways. Wasn't she the one who was ungrateful?

And she knew her life was less than his. He was human; she, glorified sea foam.

And she knew she lost her chance to join him in aerial paradise.

And in three hundred some years, when her fate could no longer be delayed, she would still feel remorse.

* * *

A/N: Yes, this is _Sea Winds Shaking_, a gift-fic to the wonderful Jax-Win. I'm cleaning up my page, and frankly this story reads like a part of _Waiting_. However, it is still, without a doubt, Jax-Win's gift-fic. **Jax-Win**, if you want it to be its own story, tell me and I'll put it back up right away.

Oh, and that reminds me. The last chapter of Waiting is in the works, but I don't really have a fairytale I want to do. If you have anything you want to see, please tell me. PM, vote in the poll, review.


	8. Maid Maleen

**Good things come to those who wait**

_The curtains rise to the ruins of a tower in a field. Like a last remnant of dead winter, it stands odd against the new buds of spring. _

_In the shadow of this stone mammoth in tar, helpless against fate and time, is a girl, sitting, thinking, waiting_.

Lonely. That's what she was, lonely. But who could blame her? It had been ten years, a long time to wait for spirits that would never come. Not her father, certainly not her prince (though he was scarcely her prince anymore, was he?), no one at all. Alone, a-lone, a-lo-ne.

She hums, bits and pieces of sailor songs, that she never would have dared to sing had there been another soul with hers.

_Well my old mother she wrote to me_  
_Me darling son come home from sea_

What was the other line? Oh well. Maybe she'll remember it later. She's been remembering all sorts of things lately, like her prince and all his pretty promises, and they were so pretty, you know? Just so pretty. Flowers in bloom in…another garden, she supposes. They aren't blooming in hers, and she coughs, suppressing a giggle. She's being so improper. Her father would have had a fit, did have a fit.

But hadn't she thrown out her dignity a long time ago? She scrunches her face in a small frown. No, no, she hadn't. She had considered it, yes, especially at the end (she was rather desperate at the end when even the crumb's crumbs were gone and then all crying, a little hopeless thing, not hysterical, never that), and had dreamt silly little dreams of chipping bit by bit the brick mortar that caged her in. She really was silly. It would have never worked. She wasn't a hero after all.

She laughs unrestrainedly now. It really was a pity, but if she were a hero, she wouldn't be here. No, she would have gone on adventures and slain dragons and maybe saved a princess or two. It really was a pity. She might have been a great hero even, like Achilles or Beowulf or all those great men her tutor always told her brothers about, whose weary eyes glitter, rejuvenated, with secondhand glory.

She would have won duels and the adulations of the courts and lived a good life, drinking and being merry, and died a good death, an honourable death, like Hector on the fields with all of Troy crying as he fell.

But it couldn't be. Her place was here. No, she was to stay, and stay she shall in her father's lands. There's nothing she could do anyways.

She idly flips her bones, sun-bleached white, as she searches for her book. (She could have sworn it was in her pocket when she—)

If she must wait, she'll need it.

_End Scene. _

_Fade to black. _

* * *

**A/N:** And that's the end darlings. I hope you enjoyed the ride.

Credits

SubjectiveReality — God-Beta and all around good friend. Make sure to read her stories which beat mine over the head with dead carps.

Morning-Sunset — Beta. Hugs and kisses for your writing block boo-boo.

All those who read, reviewed, and/or favorited — I'm eternally thankful for you guys. I really wouldn't be able to continue writing without all the support and the critiques and _everything_. For those who left comments, I loved getting to know you all.


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